Feed through capacitors are often employed for radio frequency suppressors in power supply circuits for such applications as DC powered devices for automotive vehicles, i.e., for electric motor driven devices such as fan blower motors, power window drives, etc. A capacitor is installed between the power supply and the electric motor so that one side of the capacitor windings is connected into the circuit power supply line and the opposite side of the capacitor windings is grounded so as to reduce the radio frequency radiation from the particular circuit resulting from high frequency components generated in the circuit.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,986,084, assigned to the assignee of the present application, discloses a "universal" feed through capacitor in which the drive of the capacitor windings is connected to the power circuit lines provided by a rigid conductive blade having opposite male and female ends adapted to mate with plug-in leads. In this instance, one end of the blade is connected to the device being powered and the opposite end connected into the source of power from the vehicle wiring harness.
It can be appreciated that due to the variety of electrically powered devices at varying locations within the vehicle chassis that the leads to and from the wiring harness and the device vary in length considerably.
Accordingly, each of the lead lengths is manufactured separately from the capacitor and the capacitor is later installed by connecting the lead ends to the capacitor blade.
The conventional approach has been to manufacture the capacitor with a through extending insulated wire of a relatively short length so as to protrude through either end of the capacitor assembly. The wire is secured to a contact disc by removing a section of the insulation and soldering the contact disc to the exposed wire. The contact disc is placed in position against one end face of the capacitor windings and the opposite end face of the capacitor windings is in contact with a D-clip which extends into contact with the capacitor or "can" which is made of metal and which constitutes the grounding connection for the capacitor.
The connecting leads necessary between the powered device and the wiring harness are joined to the ends of the through wire by means of wire connecting crimping fittings.
In either of the above designs, the adaptation of a single capacitor to each of the installations by connecting separate leads to the conductive blade or the central wire involves the separate cost of making the connections to the capacitor and the cost of the wire connectors, or the mating male ad female connectors in the case of the design described in the above-cited patent.
In addition, a reliability problem has been encountered in insuring a good electrical connection at these points.
In the case of the latter-described embodiment, the method of securing the contact disc to the central wire also is relatively costly, and due to breakage of the soldered connection, also may produce incidence of loss of electrical contact.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a method of manufacturing a capacitor and installing such capacitor in those applications in which separate leads to the various terminal connections are not required, to thereby eliminate the cost and incidence of failure associated with such separately installed leads.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a means for anchoring capacitor windings to a central lead line wire which does not involve a soldered connection of the lead line to the central wire, while insuring good electrical contact and anchoring of the capacitor to the central wire.